BTGF: Sick Games
by Lady Momou
Summary: A simple note can cause a whole dinner to go sour, very fast. (CONTAINS RELATIVELY DETAILED ABUSE. I'M NOT KIDDING, THIS IS PRETTY DARK COMPARED TO MY OTHER WORKS.) A Beyond the Green Flames one-shot


**This is A BEYOND THE GREEN FLAMES one-shot. The beautiful story is in the works, but to tide you over (*coughcough,KairiwillbereadingthisIknow) until we get our technical shit together, I wrote this.**

**WARNING: GRAPHIC DEPICTION OF ABUSE AHEAD. I HAVE A VERY TWISTED MIND, AND I WAS IN A SEMI-PISSY MOOD AT THE TIME I WROTE THIS. **

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><p>Jay nudged my arm, and I looked down. He was holding a piece of paper out to me. Taking it, I scooted my chair back slightly to read what it said, Jay's sloppy handwriting sprawled across in as little space as possible. It was a struggle, and I knew I would be straining my eyes to read it, but I did.<p>

_**Grab your stuff after dinner. We're taking you to your parents.**_

I looked at him, but he didn't look back, instead, he kept pleasant conversation with Cole, whose back was turned to us. There were four of us sitting at the table—soon to be five, once Cole sat down—but only four places were set. I misbehaved. I wasn't getting fed. Again. Jay would try to sneak leftovers to me when he could, so would Nya. They hated seeing me sit there with an empty place, while they got to eat. I know what they saw. I saw it every morning when I went to the bathroom. Pale, thin cheeks, deep shadows under eyes that held an old soul, seeming to scream in pain, and unhealthy hunger. It was winter, so they couldn't see what I saw when I got dressed. There were dark bruises covering my skin. My ribs and hip bones were sticking out. I shouldn't be this slim, but I am, because Cole ruled every aspect of my life.

For me, his word was law, and breaking the law led to severe punishments.

I sat there quietly as they ate, keeping my head down. The less attention I gave myself, the better I could—

"Lloyd," He said cooly from across the table, grey eyes hardening as he looked at me. I could feel their stare, and shrank back. "What are you holding?"

My heart stopped, before picking up at triple speed. The dull chatter at the table stopped, leaving us in deafening silence, all eyes on me. I dropped the note, letting it flutter down to the ground, hoping Cole wouldn't see it. "Zane, pick it up, and bring it to me."

Without hesitation, the deed was done, Cole's eyes narrowed as he read over the slip of paper, glaring at Jay, before his eyes fell on me, hard, and inhuman. He crumpled the note up tightly in his hand, before chucking it at me, the wadded up ball stinging as it hit my cheek. Cole knew his own strength, and was going to use it to do what he always did.

Inside my body, I could feel my organs trying to all force themselves into the tightest ball they could to protect themselves. I felt ready to be sick. It was too good to be true. My chances of getting out of this hell hole tonight were already slim to none, and slim had just left town, leaving me with no chance.

"C-c-" I tried to stammer out his name, fear dousing me, and penetrating deeply into my bones, making me start to shiver. Waiting. This was part of his sick game. He would make me wait before he would strike. He enjoyed seeing me frozen in terror, trying to be strong. He was like a cat playing with its catch before eating it. His eyes only hardened more, turning into solid stone, narrowing to next to nothing. His anger rolled across the table at me in waves. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Zane starting to leave the room, humming faintly. My eyes were locked on the ticking time bomb in front of me. I didn't have more than thirty seconds before—

The heavy wooden edge of the table slammed into me, knocking me over in my chair. It landed on me, food and crockery landing on me. Hot soup splashed out, burning me. I couldn't move. The table had pinned me down under it, pressing my back into the hard wooden chair. I gasped for breath, already smelling blood. Freeing a shakes hand, I touched my stinging head, fingering a long, bloody slice, possibly caused by a knife that had slid down. The burn of the soup dulled, and I gasped, struggling to breathe. Cole's terrifying face peered down at me from over the top of the table. Two arms draped over the edge, before pressing down. It dug deeper into me, and I turned my head, coughing up what was in my stomach from breakfast of yesterday. My throat burned, my whole body burned. There was no way I could breathe with him pressing the table down that way.

"COLE, STOP!" Jay and Nya were trying to push the table off of me, and I watched, feeling like I was dying. Surely if Cole kept this up long enough, I would die. Something inside of me would rip, or be crushed to the point it would break, causing some sort of massive internal hemorrhaging. No one would be able to save me in time, and my obituary would read that I had died by a table's edge.

The overwhelming pressure was released, and I saw Cole grab them, shoving them voth away from me. "I swear to god you two, you don't know when to BUTT OUT!" Slowly, I curled up, pushing myself up onto my arms, sucking in air greedily. "If you fucking get in my way, I'll throw him down those stairs and keep the door locked for a week. Any color in my face surely was washed out. I couldn't take another week down there. My blanket wouldn't survive much more gnawing. I couldn't take another forced bath from Cole afterwards, his hands everywhere, roaming my skin, cleaning off my mess... A massive shudder overcame my body, and I looked at Jay and Nya desperately.

Jay didn't lose eye contact with me. He shook his head vigorously. Nya was nearly in tears. I had no idea how bad I looked, covered in everything from the dinner table. It must have been bad. The loudest thing in the room was my breathing, which was getting quieter with every breath. Both of them looked down, and I knew what was going through their minds. This whole thing was a battle between helping and making it worse, or pretending it wasn't even happening, and turning a blind eye. Cole made the punishment for helping me a punishment to them, by treating me worse. If he locked me away tonight, I wouldn't survive much longer. I would be dead for sure.

Cole's hands came out of no where, gripping my sweater, and tossing me against the wall. As my body crashed into it, I felt it cracking, making me groan as I hit the ground. It was like I was drugged, my body no longer responded to my demands to move, to fight back, to curl up to protect my somewhat squishy underside—just like how snakes do. I laid there on the floor, coughing, looking at the fast approaching form of Cole. He stood in front of my prone form, and the look in his eyes told me everything I needed to know. My body curled up tightly at the last second, knees to my chest, arms raised to protect my head and face.

Pain. My whole body knew nothing but pain. Kick after kick slammed into me. A rib or two snapped, but he kept going. Punches and foul words rained down on me, making my skin burn in pain. There was no piece of my soul that wasn't feeling the attack. It felt loose inside of me, like it was ready to fly out of me and let me die.

Cole stomped down on my leg. Hard. The bones broke under his heavy foot, carrying much of his weight with the blow. It was like I was being pumped full of acids, and lava. The pain stabbed at me. Moving was not an option anymore.

I couldn't tell if I was screaming in pain or not. My whole world felt muddled, and quiet.

It suddenly went dark.

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><p>We watched, frozen in place by horror, as Lloyd slumped into a pile on the flood, the scream of pain dying off suddenly. It looked like he was barely breathe as he laid on the floor, his face had a small, weak stream blood dribbling down it from when Cole plowed into the table and made everything land on Lloyd, and his skin was a myriad of purple and blue blotches, bruises forming rapidly on a too-thin form. Blotches had grown across his skin, and I had counted more than three loud snapping sounds. Nya and I couldn't do anything to help him now. If we tried to move him, it may only hurt Lloyd more.<p>

I watched, horrified as Cole kept kicking him, even after Lloyd was gone. He picked Lloyd up, ripping the sweater off of him. I could see so many sick looking bruises coating his skin like a bad tie-dyed shirt. There was swelling visible, and without a shred of doubt, I knew it was from his ribs being broken.

storming across the dining room and into the kitchen, Cole dragged Lloyd's body. I could hear the door opening, and the sound of something crashing down the stairs.

He threw Lloyd down there. It was the only possibility.

Locks clicked as he closed the door, locking it up tightly. "He needs to sleep. He should be ready to train in a day or two..." With that, Cole left, keys jangling loudly.

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><p>I bit down hard on my blanket as Zane's gently hands prodded my injuries, wrapping up the worst of them. He has managed to wrap up my ribs without having to re-break them, but the same could not be said for my leg. The pain of it breaking again was enough to make me scream into the wad of blanket in my mouth<p>

"Hush, Lloyd..." He said softly, wrapping up my leg tightly. I could feel his chilled hands numbing my leg, and the bone under shifted into place. "If Cole hears you, he'll make me stop before I finish doing this.

I laid on the bed, staring up at the ceiling as Zane finished working on my injuries. Closing my eyes, flashes of my tormentors lit up behind my eyelids, making me jerk upright. Zane looked at me worriedly, but didn't say anything, instead, he pushed me back into the pillow. "Rest. You need to rest."

According to him, it had been nearly a week since I had been beaten. He claimed I had hit my head on the way down, and was still unconscious when Cole let him down to check on me the first time. I had been running a dangerously high fever when he got to me, but he said it must have been a cold I caught before being beaten. Jay and Nya had tried to call the cops, but Cole had stopped them again. Jay and Nya were searching for a house, because they both were done seeing me get beaten around.

"They want to take you with them... I don't think it's a good idea, Lloyd. You need to stay here. Cole is your legal guardian..." I tensed at the words. I knew what he had done to keep me here. He became my guardian, and with that, the abuse went a step further, wrapping me up in more sickening games. "He also said a friend called, asking if the two of you would come stay for a week after the holidays. You should be out of the cast by then, so Cole said yes." My stomach lurched. A week? A _week_?

"Oh, okay..." I said quietly, shivering a little at the thought. "Tell Cole I'll be ready to go on that day..." I bit my lip, pulling my blanket up back over me as Zane finished. He set a thermos, an apple, and several small containers on the tiny dresser down here, along with a battery powered lamp. Turning it on, a dim light lit up my room.

"I'll be back in a few days, Lloyd. Take care of yourself." Zane said, leaving a small bottle of tylenol by my bedside, next to the salve for the bruises. He started to leave, and I rolled onto my side gingerly.

I would not survive a week there. Curling up gently, I bit down hard on my lip, pressing my face into the pillow. The door was locking, and I let it out, a loud, painful scream, half-muffled by the pillow, but still loud enough to echo through the cellar. Tears were slipping out without my control, and I shook, terrified by the thought. A week could turn into two, or even three with those people.

Something heavy hit the door, making me stop.

"Don't make me come down there, you brat!" He shouted, banging on the door again. It was enough to send solid ice through my veins, freezing every cell in my body.

The last thing I wanted was for him to come down here.

Him coming down here would only end in more pain.

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><p><strong>...fun fun fun for Lloyd. <strong>

**Hope you enjoyed that, Kairi as much as I enjoyed writing it. (I also hope you catch who the "friend" is. I decided to incorporate things into this...)**

**Personally, I feel like I did Jay a disservice with his part in this little one-shot, as well as the very last part where Zane is helping Lloyd. I mostly wanted this done, to be quite honest. I felt that if I got somethings bashed out on the keyboard, it would make me more motivated to write. **

**Please tell me what you guys all thought about the most recent episodes, this story, Beyond The Green Flames (The first chapter is up on Kairi's DA page for those who want to read it) and PLEASE, someone give me more one-shot fodder before I write about a Victorian AU in which Cole is a member of the upper class, and takes Lloyd off the streets when he's about to be arrested for stealing, claiming he is an unruly servant of his house, and they end up falling in love slowly, pissing each other off at the same time. Let me know what all you guys are thinking about this little one-shot I wrote here. I love hearing from people!**


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